, 1887-05-01


out the working day. Toftburn, on or
binary summer days, is lively enough.
But who shall do justice to its feverish
liveliness, its delirious gayety, on q bank
Holiday! How shall l attempt todescribe
a first Monday in August at that attrac-
tive place, when every half hourly train
from London discharged its hundreds into
the already crowded streets. I was in
but poor spirits that day, it Ia true; but /
found some consolation in watching the
holiday pranls of my kind. From the
top Of tho west cliff, as l leaned over the
rail 8loomily observant, the whole pano-
rama of SETTLING life was below me,
under a blazing August sun.
"Alas. alas, my brothers!. l said:
THE happiness you seek so painfully does
n exist! How much wiser to lean here
on this raining, as l do, quietly, with your
pulse normal, and own that life is a
mournful puzzle scarce worth the solv-
ing!"
1t is pleasant is it not? to stand aloof
from the crowd, a La Childe Harold, and
muse upon their folly thus9
L was in this frame of mind when my
last evening in Toftburn arrived. I had
been in a very bad temper all day. In
the morning had been entrapped into an
expedition to Toftburn glen, three miles
away, with the Ridgways. We had gone
in a wagonette, with some friends of
theirs recently come down to Toftburn.
q had supposed the Reds would be going
when | accepted the invitation.)
In exploring the glen, Miss Ridgway
talked of nothing but the ''fauna and
flora Of the nelghborhood." Miss Lottie
would linger behind the rest of the party
and look sentimental. And DR.. Ridgway
got in a passion at lunch, and let the girls
have it straight, because, in taking an
nor bite of his first sandwich, he
found to his sorrow that it had a triple
share of mustard.
Even the intellectual Eliza shook in her
shoes at the wrath in the wears red face
and streaming eyes.
Returned from this unsought jaunt, |
strolled along the beach. 1t was a warm
August evening. The sun had set, but
the western sea beneath which he had
dipped his burning ACE in hopes to. cool
it, was still all crimson; the eastern sea
was cold and silver gray, flowing onward,
onward to me as 1 stood and watched it,
Il few bars of grey cloud lying above its
horizon. The sands were almost deserted.
The children and their nurses who formed
the chief beach population, were gone
away. ~The pier, the parade, and the
aquarium claimed all the evening world
of Toftburn.
Round me were the sand heaps, towers,
and castles which the children had reared
nc busily during the day, doomed o.be
,obliterated by the evening tide. Seated
at the foot OF the cliff, in a quiet
spot. where the cliffs ran out at either
side and cut me off from all the
world, l gave way to melancholy.
Suddenly round the projecting cliffs to
my right, a tall, slim figure in white ap-
peared and strolled slowly along the sands
by the margin Of the sea, looking out
over the silvery expanse of water-my
beautiful, my beloved, my Ellie, who, 1
feared, was never to DO mine! Far out
in the shallow water 1 was also aware of
the prodigy, condescending to bend his
mighty soul to so childish and human a
sport as wading and fishing with a large
net for possible marine monsters.
Il will not go to her." ! said; 81 will
leave her in peace. She does not guess
what loving ayes are watching her.
Darling, l only tease you with my pres
ence. The love you did not want and
never guessed at shall not be confessed to
yOu-SOu "Ouiu Only Dc distressed. buL
if / live a century / shall never live it
down. Oh, my little girl! if you could
have cared for me!-if l might even
have dared to tell you all you are to mel"
The slim white figure strolled along by
the margin of the evening sea.
Once she stood looking out to the
horizon, and then traced idly with the
point of her closed sunshade on tn, sand.
Tie prodigy WAC tagging behind, absorbed
in his net fishing, ami she was waiting
fl: him, al unconscious of the qaze fol-
!sTiHg her every movement so intensely.
Her Jack was TO me. And now she
WIS l. nding down, tracing with more
Ura,hod in the sand-tcacing letters there,
i woul GEM. / was too far off even
io Gue-s ii what she wis writing,
la, why did "A sudden thrill
ivr '.Iosgh HE as | watched
that su~nshade's point working 50 busiiJ a:
Why did | rise. ms recent resolve for
gotten, and with heart t~hrobbinS and eyes
.'iHS-in fact, feeling like nothing but
:; ,Ecat humping heart and II great star
ing eye-approach silently, even stealthily.
The spot where she stood:
She had completed it, whatever 1t was
she had written. She was looking at it
now. Quick! quick! a little foot was